Ledecka is a snowboarder by commerce and has solely competed in Tremendous-G for 2 years.

She had by no means positioned increased than 29th.

Ledecka gained the competitors on skis borrowed from fellow gold medalist Mikaela Shiffrin, who skipped the occasion after repeated occasion cancellations compelled her to embrace a tightened schedule.

Ester Ledecka of the Czech Republic was already set to make Olympic historical past as the primary athlete to ever compete in each snowboarding and snowboarding occasions on the Winter Olympics. Now, after what might be remembered as some of the stunning upsets in Olympic historical past, she’ll have an opportunity to win gold in each.

Ledecka is primarily a snowboarder, and has solely competed in Tremendous-G for 2 years. Previous to the Olympics, she had by no means completed higher than 29th in any occasion.

However on Friday, with Mikaela Shiffrin sitting out due her busy schedule within the wake of quite a few climate postponements within the alpine snowboarding occasions, the Tremendous-G discipline was vast open for the taking. Ledecka was able to rise to the event — and even borrowed Shiffrin’s skis to tug off the feat.

Ledecka, simply 22 years previous, completely crushed her run, ending in simply 1 minute, 21.11 seconds, holding off defending champion Anna Veith of Austria by simply .01 second to take gold within the competitors.

It is attainable that Ledecka was much more shocked with the consequence than viewers at house. She might be seen shaking her head in disbelief on the backside of the slope, and requested after seeing her time “How did that occur?”

Check out her response — it is hardly the face of somebody who believes they only gained gold.

You would be shocked, too. 😱

Ester Ledecka, a world champion SNOWBOARDER, shocks the sphere to win a surprise-gold by zero.01 in alpine snowboarding girls’s super-G! #WinterOlympics https://t.co/YtEpNzDMDu pic.twitter.com/EeoHuALcKX

— NBC Olympics (@NBCOlympics) February 17, 2018

“This should be some mistake,” Ledecka mentioned when requested what her first ideas have been when she realized she had taken over the leaderboard. “That they’ll swap the time for some others.”

Whereas it is clearly stunning snowboarder would win the gold medal on a pair of borrowed skis, Ledecka would later say that it is attainable her coming on the course with a special mindset than the competitors gave her a bonus.

“I used to be in all probability the one snowboarder on website,” she mentioned. “All the opposite ladies did not threat loads. There should be plenty of stress on them. I used to be simply attempting to do my finest run.”

Ledecka will compete once more subsequent weekend within the women’ parallel large slalom snowboarding occasion, the place she is a favourite to take house one other gold medal.

Ought to she succeed, she’ll seal her legacy as some of the spectacular Winter Olympians to ever compete.

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